Wade Redden
| birth_place = Lloydminster, Saskatchewan, Canada | draft = 2nd overall | draft_year = 1995 | draft_team = New York Islanders | career_start = 1996 | career_end = 2013 }} Wade Redden (born on June 12, 1977) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player. He played in the NHL with the Ottawa Senators, New York Rangers, St. Louis Blues and the Boston Bruins. Wade played for Canada internationally seven times, winning two gold medals in the World Junior Championships and one in the World Cup of Hockey. He was a two-time NHL All-Star. Playing Career Early Playing Career Wade played minor hockey with the teams at Hillmond High School and the Mid West Red Wings which were from the rural area. After that, he played one year with the Lloydminster Blazers before joining the Brandon Wheat Kings. After that, he was named rookie of the year. The Wheat Kings made it to two Memorial Cup while Wade was a member of the team. Wade was a member of the 1995 and 1996 Canadian teams at the World Junior Hockey Championships, both teams winning gold medals. Wade was selected second overall by the New York Islanders in the 1995 NHL Entry Draft, but he never played for the team. He was traded to the Ottawa Senators along with Damian Rhodes for Don Beaupre, Martin Straka and the rights to Bryan Berard on January 23, 1996. The trade had become necessary when the Senators' efforts to sign Berard (whom they had selected first overall in the same draft) had become futile. Ottawa Senators Wade joined the Senators for the 1996–97 season, making the team out of his first training camp. He scored his first NHL goal on his first shot against Jocelyn Thibault of the Montreal Canadiens on October 5, 1996. He would be named "NHL Rookie of the Month" for April 1997, and was an important part of the team's drive to qualify for the playoffs that season. The team would go on to make the playoffs that season, the first time in the modern Senators' history. By the 1999–2000 season, Wade was an important part of the team. On October 2, 1999, he was named alternate captain of the Senators, a position he held for nine seasons afterwards. Near the end of the season, Wade suffered an ankle injury, forcing him to miss the playoffs, a contributing factor in the Senators losing in the first round to the Toronto Maple Leafs. The following year, he continued his improvement, averaging over 25 minutes of ice time per game, scoring 37 assists, a three-point game and several two-point games. After the Senators were eliminated from the NHL playoffs, Wade was named to the Canadian national team for the first time, for the 2001 IIHF World Championship. Wade followed that up the next year with a trip to the 2002 NHL All-Star Game to represent the Senators. He would have nine multi-point games in 2002–03 and would set a personal best of 17 goals in the 2003–04 season which helped earn him a spot in the 2004 NHL All-Star Game. Wade was named to the gold-medal winning Canadian team for the 2004 World Cup of Hockey. He would also play for Canada in the 2005 IIHF World Championship. In the 2005–06 NHL season, Wade missed games because of a knee injury and to be with his mother Pat as she battled cancer. He finished the season with a career-high 50 points and a league-leading +/- of 35, in 65 games. Wade had twelve multi-point games including a four-point game against the New York Rangers on December 26, 2005.3 He was selected for the Canadian Olympic team along with teammate Dany Heatley. After the 2005–06 season, the Senators were faced with having their two top defencemen (Redden and Zdeno Chara) becoming unrestricted free agents and having to choose to sign only one to keep the team salaries within the league-mandated salary cap. The Senators chose Wade and the Senators and he agreed on a two-year contract worth $13 million with a no-trade clause, and Chara signed with the Boston Bruins. His salary made him the highest paid player on the team and the media and fans expected another top-notch season. The 2006–07 NHL season was a difficult one for Redden, playing with a new defensive partner, Andrej Meszaros who had played with Chara, however, by the time of the playoffs, Wade and Meszaros had jelled and were a strong pairing for the Senators. He participated in all of Ottawa's run to the 2007 Stanley Cup Finals, recording 10 points in 20 playoff games. The Senators lost to the Anaheim Ducks in 5 games. The 2007–08 NHL season was eventful for Wade. Newly-promoted general manager Bryan Murray attempted to trade him to the Edmonton Oilers during the 2007 NHL Entry Draft, but Wade turned down the trade proposal. Trade rumours would swirl around him for most of the season. Wade remained a starter with the team and he played in his 800th career NHL game, all with the Senators on January 10, 2008, against the Buffalo Sabres. As the team started to slump, Murray started to look for solutions to turn the team around. In February of 2008, it was revealed that Wade used the no trade clause in his contract to kill a deal that would have sent him to the San Jose Sharks for Matt Carle and a draft pick. As the leaked deal became public, he publicly declared his desire to win the Stanley Cup with Ottawa, at the time still the Eastern Conference leader. Within weeks of the aborted trade, the Sharks surpassed Ottawa in the league-wide standings. The Senators performance continued to decline, the coach was fired and the team struggled into the playoffs. Wade's numbers improved slightly over the previous season, but this was overshadowed by the size of his contract and the team's overall performance. The 2007-08 season was also the last season of the contract and speculation about his re-signing was regularly discussed in the media. Wade made it clear that he would take a "hometown discount" taking less money to stay in Ottawa. After the season, the media openly speculated that he would be leaving the Senators. New York Rangers On July 1, 2008, Wade signed a six-year, $39 million contract with the New York Rangers. His performance continued to decline in New York where he faced considerable criticism. One writer for the New York Post even called the contract "the worst in the history of the NHL, if not in the history of hard-cap pro sports." On September 25, 2010, the Rangers placed Wade on waivers, the result of the defenseman's declining play. The move also allowed the Rangers to fit under salary cap. Speaking in 2013 on his stint with the Rangers, Wade said: "I think maybe making that money there and being the player I am… I felt like the first little while, things were going pretty good, and then they kind of fell off. I felt like I wasn’t doing enough, and like I should have been doing more. Once I started feeling that way, I think I just got away from the things that made me successful. Things just kind of snowballed from there." Wade cleared waivers and was assigned to the Rangers' minor league farm team, the Hartford Wolf Pack becoming the highest-paid player in the history of the American Hockey League in the process. Wade (who admitted contemplating retirement) decided to report and play for Hartford. Of his ill-fated signing with the Rangers, one newspaper later commented that "through no fault of his own, (Wade) has become the poster-boy for free-agent foolishness." In 2011–12, Wade served as the captain of the Connecticut Whale, formerly known as the Hartford Wolf Pack. At the time of the NHL 2012 lockout, the Rangers decided not to transfer Redden to the AHL roster, thereby not having to pay his salary during the dispute. When the lockout was settled, the new collective agreement directly affected Redden in two ways (it forced teams to count any AHL player's salary above $900,000 against its NHL cap and it allowed for up to two contracts per team to be bought out for up to two-thirds of the remaining salary) without the buyout not counting against the cap in the 2013 and/or 2014 off-seasons so as to help teams get under the reduced cap, also known as a compliance buyout. However, the buyouts cannot be used on injured players. To avoid any risk of a hockey-related injury, the Rangers originally instructed Wade to simply not report to camp. While this meant that Wade (along with Scott Gomez of the Montreal Canadiens, who was in a similar situation) would still have been paid his pro-rated 2012-13 salary despite not playing, the NHLPA was concerned that for Redden and Gomez to be forced to spend an entire year away from hockey would adversely affect their ability to find employment elsewhere in the NHL during the 2013 off-season, even at a much reduced salary. On January 15th (in order to avoid this process), the CBA was revised to allow teams to use one of their two compliance buyouts prior to the start of the shortened 2013 season, with the provision that the players bought out in such a way would still be paid their pro-rated but otherwise full 2012-13 salaries (which would still count against the 2012-13 cap) and with the buyout of the subsequent years otherwise proceeding as originally intended. With the revised agreement in place, Wade was waived by the Rangers on January 16, 2013 and cleared waivers the following day. After a compliance buyout from the Rangers was completed, he became a free agent for the first time since 2008. On January 18, 2013 (on the eve of the shortened 2012–13 season), Wade signed a one-year $800,000 deal with the St. Louis Blues. The Blues activated Wade on January 23, 2013, opening the door for him to play the following night against the Nashville Predators. To make room for him, the Blues demoted Ian Cole to Peoria of the AHL. On January 24, 2013, Wade played his first NHL game since April 11, 2010 against the Nashville Predators. On January 26, 2013, Wade scored his first goal back against the Dallas Stars and played his 1,000th career NHL game on February 7, 2013 against the Detroit Red Wings. At the 2013 NHL trade deadline, Wade was traded to the Boston Bruins for a conditional 7th round pick in 2014 on April 3, 2013. The Bruins hoped Wade would rediscover the chemistry that he had with Chara and return to elite form even though he was a non-factor for the Bruins. In six regular-season games with the Bruins, he scored one goal and had one assist. In Wade's first playoff game since the 2007 Stanley Cup Finals, he scored a goal and added an assist in the Bruins' 4-1 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs. On January 9, 2014, Wade officially announced his retirement from professional hockey. Career Statistics International Statistics International Play }} Awards & Achievements *WHL Rookie of the Year: 1994 *WHL East Second All-Star Team: 1995 *WHL East First All-Star Team: 1996 *Memorial Cup All-Star Team: 1996 *NHL Rookie of the Month: April 1997 *Played in NHL All-Star Game: 2002 *NHL Defensive Player of the Month: January 2004 *Named to NHL All-Star Game: 2004 (did not play due to the flu) *Best Defenceman: 2005 IIHF World Championship *NHL Plus/Minus Award: 2006 (joint winner) *Victoria Cup (as a member of the New York Rangers): 2008 Personal Life Wade grew up in Hillmond, Saskatchewan, Canada. He is the youngest of three children: he has an older sister named Niki & an older brother named Bart. Wade attended the Hillmond School from Kindergarten to grade nine, then he attended the Lloydminster Comprehensive School for grade ten and then completed grades eleven & twelve in Brandon, Manitoba, Canada. He played hockey & softball in his younger years. During the off-season, Wade and his wife, Danica Topolnisky had a home near Kelowna, British Columbia. After two years of involvement, the couple became engaged in September of 2007 and married in August of 2008. Since moving to Ottawa to play NHL hockey, Wade became involved in the Ottawa community. He sponsored a suite at the Scotiabank Place named "Wade's World" reserved for critically and terminally-ill children that he paid for while a member of the Senators from 1997 until 2008. Wade was also involved with the charity "65 Roses Club" committed to raise money for cystic fibrosis research. He also appeared in Road Hockey Rumble in his hometown. Category:1977 births Category:New York Islanders draft picks Category:Ottawa Senators players Category:New York Rangers players Category:St. Louis Blues players Category:Boston Bruins players